


Love, After All

by bolide_belle, GlowAmber



Category: Tangled (2010), Tangled: The Series (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Drabble Collection, F/M, Imagine your OTP, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-16
Updated: 2018-06-10
Packaged: 2019-05-07 17:37:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14676087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bolide_belle/pseuds/bolide_belle, https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlowAmber/pseuds/GlowAmber
Summary: A collection of OTP drabbles of my favorite ships, some with OCs and some without. Contained to one chapter each, pure fluff and nonsense abound.Currently; Therapy  [Cassandra/Lance]





	1. .i soulmate [lights] [eins]

**Author's Note:**

> A silly modern!soul mate au for Eugene. 8D

.i soulmate [lights] [eins]

Everyone had a soulmate, a person meant for them. Or, persons, sometimes. Nonetheless, there was always comfort in knowing that somewhere out there… someone was looking for you. Searching for their perfect match in you.

It started with light. 

That wasn't to say the world was dark and dreary until you connected, just that the first touch of your soulmate sparked something. A glow that filled you, inside and out, leaving luminescent marks where you last touched. It was impossible to miss it or run from it.

And somehow, he had.

Flynn Rider sat across from his best friend in their… borrowed flat, his fingers curiously probing his upper arm. His shirt was half unbuttoned and draped off his shoulder so he could better see the oddness.

“This is insane.”

Lance’s voice barely stirred him, he was too entranced by the glowing handprint on his bicep. Someone had grabbed him, someone small with delicate hands, and had left the brightest golden mark he’d ever seen.

It felt like sunshine burning from within and streaming out, warm and soothing. It called him in ways he hadn't thought possible, beckoning him back to where he knew he’d find her again.

He wondered what color her palm was glowing, now, if she felt the same warmth or if his glow was tainted somehow by his past. Did it feel cold to her? Did her hand feel like she’d dipped it in acid, and did it itch at her like an infection? 

He knew who she was, at least; the only person who grabbed him today was the woman who saw him lift a wallet. She’d tried to stop him and Flynn had felt the burn, then, watched her green eyes fill with … something… before he had turned and ran like a coward. 

He wanted to think it was awe, maybe the first strains of love, but he knew better than that. There was no perfect match out there for Flynn Rider, and the only one hunting for him was the law. 

Still, the glow flickered and filled the room all the same as if trying to dispel his doubts. 

“Flynn? I don't want to concern you or anything, but I think it's getting brighter.”

That finally snapped him out if it. He looked away from the mark, dazed, and around the room. It was after dark but it looked like noon in their living room, the pulsating glow having taken over. He’d never seen a mark so … strong, possessive? Demanding.

The throb in it was more intense, too, and Flynn jumped to his feet, feeling dizzy as he realized what it meant.

“She's coming for me.”

He said it quiet, and then spun, his hands in his hair, “Holy sh-- Lance, she's coming for me! She's coming here!” His heart was in his throat, no one ever wanted him. This girl would change her mind when she saw, when she knew him.

Poor girl had the most rotten luck to end up with him.

Lance caught his shoulder and yanked him around, bringing them face to face. “Flynn. Everyone dreams and hopes for this, suck it up. You found yours.” He squeezed his shoulder and Flynn looked down, then back up at him, staring hard.

Twenty seven, the both of them. He had heard some people didn't find theirs until seventy and he had thought that'd be him, if he ever did. Twenty seven years, though, and he was the first of the two to find his soul mate. 

“You're right.”

He took a deep steadying breath, turning to look at the door out. He could wait for her to find him, or…

The process barely caught up to his head before he was running through the door and down the stairwell. His heart thudded faster than his feet down on the wood, almost slipping a few time as he spun the bannister to get closer and closer.

He could feel her. His mark was going insane, and he swore the stairwell below looked brighter, too. It was amazing that he could still see, but he had the idea that even if his vision failed him? His feet would know the way. He could always find the way to her.

It boggled his brain that he knew instinctively when to stop and just how close she was. He had heard others talk about what it was like to find your match, but to experience it? It was invigorating. He still felt the sheer terror of meeting her, but it was quickly being overwhelmed by the sight of her on the next landing.

Her green eyes were just as pretty as he remembered, but the whole of that heart shaped face was enough to wipe the air from his lungs. He stopped still as she did, hand on the railing, and just stared at her. Then her right hand.

The glow he saw was from her, blazing just as gold as his shoulder. It streamed out like rays of the sun and he took a staggered step towards her that she matched.

She giggled, nervously, and then he felt her throw herself into him with her arms about his midsection. He dragged her up, unable to help it, and moved back onto the landing to spin with her. 

Her head came up as he lifted her higher, forehead to his, and he’d never felt anything so right. He felt connected and whole, bursting with … he didn't even know, for sure. Was this happiness? He’d never felt this happy if it was.

“Why’d you run? I’ve been looking for you… all my life.” 

Flynn’s giggle was just as nervous as hers and he paused before he kissed the tip of her nose. 

“Just scared, I guess.”


	2. .ii springtime [gentle, slow] [eins]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Quirin meets someone that reminds him of spring and Varian is pretty attached.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Super self indulgent. Quirin and an OC based off a thing Joy and I worked up. Specifically, what if Quirin met someone and remarried, giving Varian two parents to keep an eye on him?

.ii springtime [gentle, slow] [eins]

He’d found her completely by chance. A short cut back through the woods to get home to his son more quickly had led to him rescuing a damsel in distress. There was something … odd to her, he knew, the way she didn’t quite cower away from the thugs but rather around her basket of herbs. The way she spat quiet words of venom and malice but made no move to defend herself. … The earnest way she thanked him, and the way her eyes lingered, as if she was still surprised anyone had come to her rescue at all.

It was just a chance encounter, so he had tried to put her out of mind, to let it go. He had work to do, the fields would not till or water themselves; he had no time to think about pretty women. The memory of her worn hands clasping his so gratefully remained as much the pretty color of her mismatched eyes, so different from his late Johanna. 

Quirin heaved a sigh and took a moment to rub the back of his gloved hand over his brow, wiping sweat away. The hot sun beat down heavy on him, on everyone in the village, as it had every day for the last week. Some rain would be a miracle, the crops could definitely use it. They could use it, all together, the heat was becoming wicked.

He looked over to the tree line to where he’d left Varian for the moment, debating on whether or not to take a break for lunch for the both of them, only to stop dead and incline his head. The very woman he was struggling to forget was making her way out of the trees with his young son toddling behind her and talking animatedly. That, in itself, wasn’t unusual. Varian tried talking to anyone who listened, the boy had yet to meet a stranger much to Quirin’s displeasure. What was odd was how she tilted her head to listen to him and look at the plants he was showing her-- and hell, the boy was a mess again.

He ran his hand down his face, already walking towards them. He’d just given Varian a bath the night before and the kid was already filthy, it looked like he’d rolled in the mud. Where had he found mud? Had he been by the water?

“Varian.” It took just one word to have his five year old stop dead and look up at him before the boy’s small face split in a wide grin that never failed to pull at his heartstrings. The woman beside him, and why hadn’t he gotten her name??, just adjusted her hold on the basket she was carrying and-- on Varian’s hand. When Varian pulled, however, she let go with eyes meeting Quirin’s and a small smile playing at her lips.

“Daddy! Daddy, look what I found!” Varian barreled into his legs before holding up the weeds with dirt clumped roots attached, and he bent down to try wrestling them from his sticky grip. He heard her laughing as she got closer, her basket full of familiar herbs and… even a few of the weeds, though much cleaner looking.

“They’re not just weeds,” She told him plain, “They make a nice salad for young growing boys.” Something about the way her brown hair was tied back and curved around her face, the subtle lines around her eyes-- Quirin swallowed and tried to smile in return. He wasn’t much for talking, Johanna had often filled the silence between them, and he found himself floundering for words as the stranger bent down to his son.

She held her hand out and Varian put a few of the weeds in it, giggling madly, to watch as she patiently stripped the dandelion down into pieces. When she popped a leaf in her mouth, his son did the same to chew on it, chubby cheeks smeared with dirt and stained green. Logically, he knew he should be doing something about the strange woman who was so casual with his little boy, but he felt no malice from her at all. 

When she stood back up, she tucked some of her hair back behind an ear and fixed him with that smile again. Patient and strangely pleased looking, Quirin felt… odd. Taken? It wasn’t like it was with Johanna, his late wife had been all fire and heat, but something about this woman’s slow grace was … nice. 

She rummaged through the flora in her basket before she pulled out a small clay jar, offering it over to him. “My gratitude for assisting me, the other day,” she wiggled the jar when he didn’t take it, “It’s a cream for your hands, I saw how chapped they were when you took your gloves off. I can only imagine what hardships a farmer puts his hands through and thought this might help with any cracking.”

It was … thoughtful. Quirin turned the jar over in his gloved hands, examining it before he circled the lid to take a glance at the thick cream within. It smelled a little of honey and something more musky and woodsy; pleasant, actually. Was he smiling? He thought he might be, unable to help it, and looked back up to find her smile hadn’t diminished at all.

“Donna,” He blinked, and her eyes squinted a little with her broadening smile. “My name is Donna,” she repeated to him and he startled with a cough and tucked the jar away in his pocket.

“Quirin, and this is my son, Varian.”  
“He said as much.”

It was an awkward moment, he was floundering mentally for words while she waited for him to say more before she turned half away. “Well, it was pleasant to meet you again, and your son. He’s a … surprisingly delightful child.” Most people didn’t care for Varian but he had the feeling that from the way her brows lifted and her lips pursed, she wasn’t saying that for the same reasons others would. 

\----------

She came back the next day, he found out, when he found Varian in the shade of the trees with her. Dappled sunlight painted them in an oddly affectionate way, highlighting the warmer tones in their skin, and he felt like he’d stumbled on a fairy’s glen for a moment. Her over skirt was tied up along her hips and her apron pockets were near full to bursting, both of them clad in daisy chains and grins. Varian’s chubby fingers were as green as hers, and he watched from the edge as his son held up different flowers and plants to her and listened to her tell him what they were and what they were used for.

“Daisies, you can use them for coughing and lung weakness.” And then, “A pinecone? Green ones can be used for the same thing.” She clicked her tongue at Varian’s incessant giggling before taking the pinecone away from him, “This one is too old for that, however, and don’t you nibble on that. We could always get pine nuts out of it and those are edible, but there are no medicinal uses for them.”

Quirin knew Varian was insatiable for knowledge, but she fielded his questions without irritation. In fact, she seemed rather impressed, maybe even glad, to share what she knew. As he took a step closer, she stiffened for a moment and he could tell that she was aware of someone, of him. Still, she relaxed once her questing eyes found him, shoulders easing and her smile starting. 

He watched her bend forward and whisper something in his son’s ear before Varian whipped around, excited, and then went running through the tall grass to throw himself into his father’s open arms. He listened, quiet still, to Varian’s excited babbling about while he learned, eyes on the woman who merely lifted a hand in greeting before leaving deep into the forest again.

\----------

She came and went, Quirin found, spending her mornings and afternoons entertaining Varian while she hunted for the tools of her trade. Donna, apparently, made salves and poultices to sell and was quite good at what she did. Healers were always welcome around the smaller villages that lacked doctors even if some whispered she dabbled in more than just herbal remedies. There was always a smile for him and a growing fondness in her gaze when he met her at the forest’s edge to send his son her way. Varian much preferred her to the village women (Who had never quite liked him) and to sitting alone, and if she didn’t mind keeping an eye on him… well. He didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth.

It only felt like it was a short time before he found her on his doorstep every morning, waiting to watch Varian while he worked the fields, and then in his home every afternoon with the evening’s meal prepared. 

She spoke a little more each time, filling the silence in a comfortable way and entertaining his son with different recipes. Sometimes, when he came home early, he’d find them wrist deep in a mixture as she taught him how to make medicinal creams and syrups. Other times, she had a book open with Varian on her lap as they went over different lessons in mathematics or literature.

Not on purpose, he was growing fond of her. Johanna hadn’t gotten to spend much time with their boy and so Varian latched onto her fast, which didn’t make things much easier for Quirin. Or it did. He wasn’t sure how he felt about the whole scenario. It was good to have someone else helping watch his son, to care for the house, while he worked and helped the village. He’d forgotten what it was like to be a team.

Something else itched about his mind, though. He wasn’t sure how to inquire or how to go about it, only that he finally found the gumption one night when he came home to Varian tangled up in her arms on her lap. It was strange how natural it looked, his boy playing with the pendant she wore on a long leather cord and her fingers working on the day’s knots from his hair. 

“... What… does your husband think of you being out every day, like this?” His throat felt dry as he asked. Opening this line of conversation was… nerve wracking, to say the very least. He still wasn’t sure he was ready for the answer, no matter what it was.

She hummed, paused, then carried on detangling Varian’s hair. “Oh, no, I’m unmarried.” Quirin thought she was smiling, but with how her head was tipped, he wasn’t sure. He looked away, trying to focus on anything else in the room as he cleared his throat.

“You must have suitors, then.”  
“On the contrary, I have none.”

The answer hung in the air and he struggled to find the next words, looking around his house for the motivation to speak up. Everything was neat and orderly, kept clean by her own hands. A few racks of herbs hung drying on his walls, hers and Varian’s, and little bottles of spices lined the mantle of the crackling fireplace. She kept his home and kept his son, for anyone else this would be an easy question. Some would say it wasn’t even a question of love, but he had loved his late wife so deeply that he disagreed.

It still felt thick in his throat and he felt a little queasy as he turned back to her. “... I hope it isn’t… too forward to ask… ?” The question trailed off because nerves seized him again, he wasn’t a man of many words and could never pretend to be. 

Donna tilted her head down, pressing her cheek into Varian’s hair as his son turned big blue eyes up at her and then his father. There was a noticeable shift in the air, enough that he’d picked up on it, and was trying to find the answers as he was wont to do. 

“Quirin, are you asking me to marry you?”

Her smile was teasing and he felt his chest seize a little, his throat constricting by just how familial and near perfect the picture they made. No one could blame him, either, for how red and hot he got suddenly, trying anything to look away. He’d had months to find affection for her and while it wasn’t the same as it was with Johanna… He still felt it. Her smile never failed to stir something in him, and he looked forward to coming home, again, to a home that wasn’t empty and cold. The worst part of his night only came when she left just before dark to the woods, always politely refusing his offers to walk her home in favor of him putting Varian to bed.

Varian had caught on, however, to what was going on and he leapt to life in Donna’s grasp, wriggling to turn and face his father with an expectant look and a gap tooth smile from where his front teeth were missing. “Daddy! You should marry Donna!” He was all youthful exuberance and delight, bouncing in her grasp. 

Donna laughed quietly and Quirin pressed a hand over his mouth, not sure if Varian was quite clear on what marriage meant… And then again, his son was clever enough that he might just in fact know what it meant. Or at least a portion of what it meant. 

He met her eyes over Varian’s head, offering a hopeful smile, and then flushed anew when she grinned wide at him. This proposal had gone about as well as his first one, but, he felt a little relief when he asked again, properly, and she gave him a definitive yes.

It was a different kind of love, gentle and slow, and Quirin felt the better for it.


	3. Specialty [therapy][eins]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Modern!AU but the crew all went to a specialty school for arts and STEM majors. Super established relationship. The specialty school au is 1000% me and Joy's both.

“Aren’t you even a little bit curious? I mean, I’m the last person to make you do something like this if you don’t want to, but what if they are?”

Lance was on the couch, cupping a fresh mug of coffee, while Cassandra milled about their living room as she got ready for the day. He ignored her question in favor of admiring how at home she’d become, how fluidly she moved back and forth and picked up things she’d just set down the day before.

It was the mark of a happy home that her wallet laid out in the open on one of the bookshelves, that her keys could be found dropped by the little potted succulents on the side table. He watched as she tilted to the side and bent as she stepped into her sneakers, hooking a finger in the back of them to pull them past her heel. Her hair curved around her face and her profile in just the perfect way, even her errant curls looked like they’d been deliberately done. He wished he was an artist, like Rapunzel, because he wanted to capture these tiny moments of their comfortable life.

“Arnie?”

He met her eyes as she stood up, hands finding purchase on her hips, and then looked back to his coffee with a shrug. “They aren’t my parents, Cassie, I don’t have anyone out there looking for me.” Eugene’s family had found him and it had gone swimmingly, he was really happy for his friend. Given how long he’d wanted to know his biological family, as a kid, and how much they had wanted him and and just welcomed him back? Lance would be lying if he said he wasn’t a little jealous.

But Eugene had been found as an infant-- Lance had been dropped off when he was six. While the former had no memories to hold onto of a family, he had. They were vague, now, he struggled to recall what his mother’s voice sounded like or what his father’s face looked like. The shape of them spinning and dancing in home empty and poor, filling it with love and laughter instead of material objects, was his strongest happy memory of them. Even that seemed blurred around the edges, at times. 

Cassandra had been planning on a run, he knew, she always left so early for a lap around the block. He wasn’t surprised when she dropped beside him on the couch and her lean form pressed into his side, a hand lifting his arm to wrap it around her instead. He juggled his coffee for a moment before he gave up and put it down, pulling her closer. Her lips found his cheek, then his temple as she stretched up. He breathed out when her forehead pressed against his, her weight more squarely set on his lap now, hands cupping his cheeks.

“How old were you?” Her eyes burned into his, olive green and more intense than they had any right to be.

They were both orphans, they knew, and now she knew he was more like her than Eugene. While they had swapped their stories readily, when they were younger, it hadn’t occurred to her or her adopted brother that Lance was holding back. He had been so good at talking around it, of giving enough that they hadn’t pressed for more.

His throat felt thick even as he conjured that smile, “Six.”

She sucked in a deep hiss of breath and he hastened onwards, “It’s fine, Cassie, I was real mature for a six year old. I knew it wasn’t my fault, that it wasn’t their fault-- it’s okay.” He was lying, he hadn’t known it then, but he had tried to detach himself emotionally from the vague memory of his mother’s calloused hands cupping his face like Cass was. From the tears that dripped down her cheeks and the strain in her voice as she told him to sit on the step of the church like a good boy, that she loved him.

“They were poor,” He rambled, gentle, barely recognizing the shake in his voice, “We were poor and starving. My stomach always hurt, I was always so hungry… They did what was right, they were good parents. They loved me.” 

Cassandra wasn’t asking for more, she was in her listening phase, letting him pour himself out into her capable hands. God, he loved her, there was something grounding about the heat of her breath against his lips and the slight tickle of her hair against his skin. 

“I know these people aren’t my family, because I looked up my parents as soon as I could, soon as I was able. Cassie, they’re dead. It’s why I never bothered dreaming about them coming back, about leaving like Eugene did-- there wasn’t anyone ever coming.” 

He didn’t realize he was crying, at all, till she was wiping his cheeks clear and kissing the space between his brows.

“Honey, Arnie, have you thought about going to therapy? You know me and Eugene both had to go, you know it works--”

“And what?” He barked a short confused laugh, “Cassandra, we’re actors. The public eye is constantly on us, do you know what the media would say if they heard I was in therapy? They’d shred my image and you know how it is.” Ever since he and Eugene had made it big, their first official parts being leads in a Disney’s revivial of The Adventures of Flynnigan Rider, they’d had to toe a careful line for their reputation. Years later, he still walked it.

“... So maybe couples’ therapy? I’m sure we could find someone who was willing to help.”

Lance gave her an incredulous look, “And then the media would think we were having problems in our relationship. I don’t want that nightmare, honey.” 

He was proud of how good they looked in the news, he’d gone from acting to broadway and she’d found her specialty as a stuntwoman turned low budget action heroine. Of course Rapunzel and Eugene were the other young love couple everyone talked about, but he was biased and preferred the articles about himself and his highschool sweetheart.

There was something odd to the way that Cassandra leaned back, though, pulling apart to chew on her lower lip and fold her arms in front of her. Defensive avoidant behaviors-- never a great sign. He leaned forward to slide arms around her waist and tug her back in, fully aware of how she wasn’t looking at him.

“What if we went to couples’ therapy, anyways, and just said it was because we were taking the next step?”

He felt his heart seize at those words, his breath stolen away from him. “Are we taking the next step?” 

They’d talked about marriage, years ago, when they were still in school and figuring out their futures. Cassandra had dryly told him that she didn’t much care for it, and while he did? He loved her enough that he could live without it. Lance hoped to high heavens she wasn’t just teasing him, that this wasn’t a prank or a joke because he hated how the butterflies filled his stomach with just the idea of her being his future wife.

“... Do you want to take the next step?” She was being avoidant, careful, watching him from the corner of her eye, and he squeezed her light.

“Cassie, do you?”

What had they been talking about, before? He couldn’t remember, didn’t remember the fluttering feel of panic and sorrow gripping him. He was too focused on the way she finally turn back to him, open and vulnerable and honest. Her fingers smoothed up his chest, neatening his pajama shirt before laying across his shoulders. She still hadn’t looked him in the face, kept her eyes on the collar of his shirt, “I don’t have a ring to offer.”

“I don’t need one,” Lance couldn’t help the half giggle that welled up, choked and caught in his throat. “Are you actually asking me to marry you?” 

“Yes?” She glanced up, the uneasy half smile curving her lips, and he felt like crying again. For new and better reasons, for more fulfilling and happy reasons. “Arnwaldo Schnitz, will you marry me?”

“Really. Really?” 

“Fiiiiine. You stubborn-- Lance Strongbow, love of my life, thief of my heart, pain in my ass, will you marry me?” And then she surged forward, kissing him softly, pleadingly, stealing his breath away again and then his heart when she broke the contact to whisper, “Please?”

“I thought you’d never ask!” And his tears were only partially fake, his reaction was only somewhat overdramatized. He lifted her up as he sprung to his feet, spinning her in a wild pivot with a broad grin on his face. And then he stilled, his face to her collarbone and a nervous giggle escaping him, “... God, Cassie, I thought you’d never ask.”

“Arnwaldo, you never gave me a goddamn answer and I’m on kind of dying, up here.” She was only mock stern, the sharpness of her tone betrayed by the softness of her lips to the crown of his head. He tilted his head up to steal a kiss, then another, determined to leave her as breathless as she had left him. Lance could spend a lifetime, and the next, tangled up in this woman and never regret a moment of it.

“Yea, Cassie, honey… I’ll marry you.”


End file.
